Ask an Expert

This week’s Ask an Expert is a very special one since we are welcoming a new expert to our wonderful panel.  Her name is Melanie McGrath and her expertise is on bilingual education.  Read more about her below and click  here to send her your questions. Today´s question was sent by Chris Cannon: “What are the advantages/disadvantages of full immersion school versus half-immersion school? Background: We have boy/girl twins who have attended (full) Spanish immersion preschool for the last twoRead More ...

This week’s Ask an Expert question was sent by Yaz who says she’s getting discouraged because she didn’t think it would be so hard to raise bilingual children. We’ve all felt that way at some point in our journey, Yaz! Please hang in there and know you can always come back to SpanglishBaby for support. “I’m the mama of a very bright and sweet 19 months old. My first language is Spanish and my husband’s is English. We have aRead More ...

Today´s question was sent by Tricia, who is looking for advice on how to create a perceived need for Spanish in her family.  For more tips check out this article Roxana recently wrote on the topic. “Do the experts have any advice on creating a perceived need for Spanish in families that aren´t from any sort of Spanish-speaking cultural background? We´re located in a rural area with almost no Spanish speakers, making it even more difficult. We are making itRead More ...

This week’s Ask an Expert question was sent by Blanca Gómez Anaya. “I am concerned that my five-year-old daughter is losing her Spanish skills too quickly since starting English-only kindergarten. We spoke to her primarily in Spanish since she was born. Now that she is in kindergarten in an English-only school district, she is speaking very little Spanish. My husband and I had decided to have him speak to her in Spanish and I would speak to her in English.Read More ...

This post was originally published on May, 11th 2009. Today’s question was sent by Jasmine Caruthers. She’s pregnant with her first child and, both she and her husband know they want their child to learn Spanish even if they don’t speak it themselves. “I am pregnant with my first child and both my husband and 
I speak English. However, I would like to raise my child to speak both 
English and Spanish. I was going to send my baby toRead More ...

This post was originally published on April 27, 2009. Another Monday another question answered by one of the members of our amazing and always growing panel of experts as part of our weekly series: Ask an Expert. If you have missed previous entries, no worries, you can catch up on all their useful advice by clicking here. Today’s question comes from Natalia Coto an Argentinian living in Calgary, Canada, with her two sons, 29 and 10 months old and monolingualRead More ...

Q- What if I plan to raise my baby in a bilingual environment? Will using signs confuse him? A- This is a great question, and one that concerns so many families. Our world definitely seems to be shrinking and families who speak more than one language are eager to pass on their “cultural roots” to the next generation. Learning more than once language from birth gives children so many benefits. Benefits that last a lifetime! In the short-term, however, babiesRead More ...

This week’s Ask an Expert question was sent in by Susan, and is raising her sons trilingual. “My husband and I are raising our sons to be trilingual–I speak to them in Spanish and he speaks to them in German. He will learn English since it is the majority language, and he understands it since my husband and I speak to each other in English. My oldest son, 22 months, has done very well with both languages, and easily movesRead More ...